Decker's hat trick powers Pennington boys' soccer over Princeton

PRINCETON BOROUGH — If one was passing by Princeton High, one might have heard some loud sounds.

No, there weren’t any drills scheduled for the area, and there weren’t any fireworks going off. The rather loud noises were caused by the foot and head Ethan Decker, the Pennington School boys’ soccer team’s all-everything player. He exploded for three goals as the Red Raiders topped the Little Tigers, 4-0, in the quarterfinals of the Mercer County Tournament.

The win gives fifth-seeded Pennington a dream match-up with top-seeded and unbeaten Allentown at 7 p.m., tomorrow at Ewing or Robbinsville High.

“That felt good to get some revenge after what happened last year,” said Decker the Manahawkin resident, referring to the 1-0 win Princeton had over Pennington in last year’s final. “Now we move on to the semifinals, and hopefully we’ll make it and win it for the first time. Coach (Chad Bridges) told us that we’d never won a game against them, so it was awesome to be the first team to beat them.”

After a scoreless first half, Decker took a great pass from Pat Devlin 12:30 into the second half. A flying Decker got his head on the ball and redirected it into the back of the net. Seven minutes later, a Little Tigers player was called for a hand ball inside the box. It was Decker who booted home the penalty kick.

“In the first half, they were killing us; they had the ball the whole entire time,” Decker said. “At halftime, we felt that we could win the game, and we made some adjustments. I moved to the midfield in the second half, because it was hard to control the midfield, because they have good play makers there.”

With 18:16 left, Henry Bonilla took the ball deep into his offensive corner as Bridges yelled, ‘Why are you going there?’ The talented midfield found Devlin heading for the goal and delivered a perfect pass as Devlin knocked home the third goal.

And, if that didn’t seem enough, Decker, who will play soccer at the University of North Carolina next fall) took a Kevin Dillaway pass on the left side, took three dribbles to his right and ripped a hard shot past goalie Laurenz Reimetz.

“We did make a couple of adjustments at halftime, and I think the first half was just both teams feeling each other out,” Bridges said. “Second half, we decided to establish our game. We played our game instead of you know kicking and running. We played possession, and that’s how we’re successful. Second half, it opened up for us, and we got some nice passing combinations. Plus we got the ball to Ethan on that play that Pat got him the ball, and Ethan’s dangerous in the air. A lot of talk is about his play with his feet, and we know he’s fantastic with his feet, but we know he can go up and get a ball
too, and he did that tonight. And, once we got the first one, there was no stopping us.”